Bacteriological profile of diabetic foot ulcer using hicrome UTI Agar

Abstract

Introduction: Foot ulcers are one of the common complications of diabetes mellitus. Diabetic foot ulcer infections are usually polymicrobial infections. For effective treatment, quick isolation and identification of causative organisms with appropriate antibiotic susceptibility testing is needed.

Objective: Isolation and identification of bacteria using routine media and HiCrome UTI agar.

Materials and Methods: Samples were taken from all Type II diabetes mellitus patients with foot ulcers attending hospital. Samples were collected from deeper portion of the ulcer using 2 sterile swabs and processed using conventional methods and HiCrome UTI agar. Antibiotic susceptibility testing was done on Mueller Hinton agar according to CLSI guidelines.

Results: Among 100 samples tested, 138 organisms were isolated as 38% of samples yielded mixed growth. Conventional methods failed to detect 6 (4.3%) isolates form mixed cultures. HiCrome UTI agar isolated all organisms in the cultures including 4 isolates of enterococci and 2 isolates of MSSA, which were missed in conventional methods (p < 0.01). Pseudomonas (22.4%) was commonest organism isolated. Followed by Klebsiella spp. (18.8%), Proteus spp. (15.2%), MSSA (13%), Escherichia coli (11.5%), Citrobacter spp. (7.2%), MRSA (7.2%), Enterococcus spp. (4.3%).

Conclusion: Gram negative organisms (75.3%) were predominantly isolated in the study. HiCrome UTI agar can be used for primary identification and quick isolation of organisms where facilities for routine culturing are not available. It is both sensitive and specific in isolating and identifying organisms as in polymicrobial infections.